I use a number of online tools to help me create the best possible content in an efficient way. Here are my top five.
1. Grammarly
Described as an “online typing assistant”, this tool highlights mistakes relating to spelling, grammar, punctuation and clarity – super handy, then, for a writer and editor selling words for a living.
When I’m providing quality assurance services for agencies, sometimes I’m the last person to see a piece of work before the client does. The last thing I want is for there to be a pesky missing word or typo lurking in there, which would a) (rightfully) annoy the client and b) make me look terribly unprofessional. The truth is, though, it can be a challenge to catch all of these tiny details when you’re looking at high volumes of work. With Grammarly, they’re glaringly obvious and very easy to fix.
You can set it to US/UK English, which is handy for when I’m providing translations in US English and want to ensure I’m using ‘color’ instead of ‘colour’ and -ize rather than -ise suffixes.
2. wordcounter.net
I use this simple editor to highlight repeated words in texts I’m writing and editing. As part of my work, I produce product and category descriptions – sometimes huge volumes of them. It’s easy to unintentionally repeat words, which lowers the content’s quality. Nobody wants to see ‘eye-catching’ twice in a 400-word category description about women’s blue shirts – once is far more impactful.
To use the tool, all you do is paste your text in the large box. The words and the number of occurrences will appear under Keyword Density on the right-hand side.
3. Title Case Converter
This one’s pretty straightforward – as the name suggests, it converts titles into title case. This is the case used for titles of blogs, books and films as well as headlines and, sometimes, headings. The basic rule is that major words such as nouns and adjectives are capitalised, while minor ones like prepositions and articles (e.g. ‘the’ and ‘of’) should appear in lowercase.
In short, I can never quite remember what the rules are. For example, with some words, such as ‘on’, it depends whether it’s being used as a preposition or an adjective/adverb. Sound confusing? I agree, which is why I love Title Case Converter. To use it, you just copy and paste your title and press convert, and you get your answer – which you can then transfer neatly back onto your piece.
4. Toggl Track
This time tracker is an invaluable tool I use to calculate how long tasks take. When I first became self-employed, I was really struggling to manage my time and tended to voice this to others. A friend recommended Toggl to me (thanks, Delphine!) to help with organisation and planning. I have to say it drastically improved my working day as soon as I started using it.
With the app, I can create projects that I can then attach to different clients. Once the entry’s there, all I have to do is press play and it starts tracking. I can then work out how long I’ve spent doing a certain job – which is very useful if I’m charging by the hour! At the end of each day and week, I can see at a glance how many hours I’ve put in which, in turn, I can use to calculate my average hourly rate.
It also helps me stay focused. How? Well, if I know the timer’s going, I’m less likely to allow my attention to drift elsewhere. And if I forget to press stop or play? No problem. The manual mode allows me to create entries after the event. You can also download the app onto smartphones, so if I forget to press stop when I’ve finished work, I can do it from elsewhere. Handy!
5. Google Docs
I don’t know what I’d do without Google Docs. I’ve been a fan of Microsoft Word since my GCSE days in the 1990s, and remain faithful to this trusty writer’s canvas – indeed, I still use it regularly since some clients prefer it.
Google Docs is the modern-day version of Microsoft Word. There are a few little differences you need to get used to when first using it, but I really like that it saves automatically and that multiple users can edit it at the same time. It’s way faster than attaching documents to emails, that’s for sure!